


Foundation Discoveries

by TheLadyOfFangorn



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Adventure, Books, Gen, Lots of Books, Minor Character Death (Mentioned), Mystery, Supernatural Elements, Team as Family, look I am shit at tagging I'll end up editing these later I promise
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:47:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23151205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLadyOfFangorn/pseuds/TheLadyOfFangorn
Summary: When Gwen Byrne finds out one of her former professors deeded his possessions to her after his death, she finds a cryptic note with mentions of an "old friend" and instructions to call the person. When she dials the number, she doesn't realize that she is opening the door to a world she's never given a thought to before.Takes place in my Tenn Beleg 'verse (literally meaning 'great verse'). It's a melding of every fandom I've ever loved over the years.
Kudos: 1





	Foundation Discoveries

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for taking the time to click on this fic! It's greatly appreciated! I apologize for any spelling or grammar errors. Also, if you see a character or element that you think you might recognize from another fandom, it's probably because they/it is from that fandom. I seem to have this terrible habit of mashing up every fandom I've ever taken a shine to into this one big headcanon universe called the Tenn Beleg.   
> Well, I should probably stop talking now. I do tend to natter on a bit...  
> (oh, also we're going to pretend I know something about how information on coroner's reports is spatially organized)

As soon as she opened the door, she wished she hadn't. The musty smell of books, long outdated, and clothes stored in their cardboard coffins with the ever-faithful mothballs wafted out of the cramped basement. Sighing in resignation to the task of clearing out the hodgepodge of items, she stepped gingerly down the steep concrete stairs, disturbing the thick layer of dust that covered everything. Reaching for and finding the light switch, she was partially blinded when the row of bare bulbs came to life in all their glaring glory. Blinking owlishly, she stared at the daunting task before her.   
Bookshelves lined the walls, stretching from floor to ceiling, filled with the tomes of long-forgotten writers. Stacks of paintings, carefully padded with cardboard, sat in rows against the far wall, labels yellowed and peeling with age. The floor was almost completely obscured by the boxes that sat in neat stacks. Banker's boxes, moving boxes, even cereal boxes all sat, full to the brims with only God-knows-what, lovingly sealed with packing tape and labeled in a slightly shaky scrawl. James had always taken pride in his possessions, and had painstakingly packed them away when he knew he was dying.   
She looked down at the supplies she was armed with. Two garbage bags, a notebook for recording items of interest, a flashlight, and a knee cushion. Yeah, about as useful as a sweater in Alaska.   
After contemplating where best to start, Gwen backed out of the basement, in search of her portable radio. If she was going to play archaeologist, she was damn well going to have some background noise.   
~  
An hour into the cleaning and cataloging, she decided that her mentor had been even more eccentric than she thought. James had always been an oddity, from the top of his immaculately groomed russet-colored hair, liberally salted with silver in his later years, to the bottoms of his eternally-shiny brown Oxford loafers. The man was always either wearing a suit and tie, or a t-shirt and khaki shorts- there was no in-between.  
But now, as she stared bewilderingly into a box of books written either in Latin or Sanskrit- and really, she didn't know if she could tell the difference- Gwen suspected that James had been much, much more than a history professor at the local college. Flipping through the top book, she saw that it resembled the others she had found in the boxes. Precisely drawn images illustrated the pages at regular intervals; pictures of mythical beasts and sketches of foreign symbols that held no meaning for her.   
Gwen had absolutely no idea why Dr. Thorburn had left his entire estate to her, a no-name, fresh-out-of-uni student who happened to enjoy his classes and had taken the time to be friendly to her professor. She had been stunned when the phone call from his attorneys' office came, simply staring into space while the lawyer on the other end spoke in legal jargon she didn't understand. Still, she caught the gist- James has willed his estate to you in lieu of any living relatives. The following days had passed in a colourful whirl, punctuated by her visit to the attorneys' office, the signing over of the estate, the packing of her meager belongings and driving them from her cheap apartment to the house in her clapped-out Mini.   
She was startled from her moody reverie by a cheery announcement that issued from the radio, and warned of approaching thunderstorms. Closing the book and putting it back in the box it had come from, she stood and began stretching her stiff muscles. As the radio announcer continued chattering on about how much rain they would be getting, her thoughts turned to her car- specifically, her windows. Did I roll them back up? Surely I did. Damn. Should probably go check anyways, to be on the safe side.   
Threading her way through the boxes, she reached for the doorknob and nearly missed the note pinned on the basement side of the door. There was that scrawl again, familiar after reading the labels on so many boxes.   
_"Dear Gwenivere," _the short note began, _"I believe that you possess unusual strength, and hope you will be able to carry on my work. Be careful, and always keep something sharp near to hand. If you need help understanding the books, contact the number on my desk. She's an old friend who saved my hide on more than one occasion. She'll explain everything to you. Good luck, Gwen. Yours,  
James Thorburn" _  
Hmm. Why would she need to keep _"something sharp near to hand" _? Hopefully it wasn't a grandiose way of saying the house had giant rats, she thought gloomily. Well, it wouldn't hurt to see if there really was a number on his desk.  
Her car windows forgotten, Gwen carefully unpinned the note and, folding it, placed it in the breast pocket on her flannel. Ascending the stairs, she emerged into the warm air of the living room. James' office, she remembered from the floor plan the attorney had so helpfully provided, adjoined the kitchen. She crossed the richly colored wood floor with purposeful strides, navigating around chairs and end tables lying in wait, hoping to give the first unsuspecting chap a good knock on the shin.  
Ignoring the numerous trinkets and curios on the desk, she zeroed in on the address book beside the landline. On top of the small leather-bound volume was a yellow Post-It note, with a phone number printed very clearly. Below the number, in smaller, looser lettering, was a first name- Sarah.   
Apprehension and excitement began to curl in her belly when she saw that there actually _was _a number, and she hadn't been led on. Pulling out her phone, Gwen dialed the number and held the phone to her ear.  
The dial tone rang, and rang, and rang...frankly, she had lost all hope that someone would pick up. Gwen was just thinking of hanging up and chalking it up as a pointless exercise, when the dial tone cut off and the phone was answered.   
"Hello?" a masculine voice said (really, when you see a feminine name like _Sarah _paired with a number you're usually expecting a woman to pick up) answered. Gwen could hear someone in the background cursing quite creatively, then a louder _"Damnit, Clint! Give me my phone! Aww no- Tony! I'm going to hogtie you in a minute, I swear..." _  
A bit more rustling, then a feminine voice came on the line "Sorry, he's being an ass today. Actually, they all are. Sometimes I think I'm a babysitter for toddlers. _Get off! _How ye been, James?"  
Clearing her throat, Gwen spoke timidly, "Um, this isn't James. This is G-Gweneviere Byrne-"  
Gwen could almost feel the sudden change in the other speaker- the voice took on a clipped quality, and she could hear an accent -Irish? British? no, that was definitely some kind of Scottish- coming through quite strongly. "Where's James?"  
Cringing internally, she spoke even more quietly, "James...he, well, he died almost a week ago. I-I'm sorry..." she trailed off, unsure of what else to say.   
The other end of the line went silent for a moment, before, "Are you at his house?"  
"Yes, why?"  
There was a hint of steel in the woman's voice as she spoke. "I'll be there in seven hours. If you're lyin' to me, if James is there and he's been hurt in any way and you have somethin' to do with it, you'd best run, and run far, darlin'."  
There was an abrupt click, and the line went dead. Gwen set the phone down, wondering if she should be afraid. Because, strangely enough, she wasn't. She was intrigued.   
~  
Sarah scanned the data she had obtained from the coroner's database. The information she was most interested in was listed at the top.   
_James Aidan Thorburn  
Date of Birth: Friday, November 18, 1904  
Date of Death: Tuesday, January 29, 2019 _  
"'Ell. Well, I guess I might shouln't've scared her," she muttered.  
"Mmm" was the reply that came from the general direction of Tony (really, all of the team's 'hmms' began to blend together after seventy-two hours awake and two missions supervised).   
"'Mmm?' Oh, that's helpful. Very insightful. I can see why people call you a genius. Call Agent Philip Coulson," she dictated to her earpiece. As the line rang, one could almost see her pulling on her 'agent' persona; the back straightening, the shoulders squaring, and a determined angle to the head. When the phone was answered, her thick accent had been toned down until it was almost unnoticeable. "Agent Coulson? Yes sir, this is Kingsguard. You don't have me slated for any urgent assignments for the next two days, correct? OK, excellent. Yes sir, I need to run over to N.C. to take care of some unfinished business for a friend. Yes sir, two days at the most. Thank you. Goodbye."   
"Want some company?" Barton said, attention not wavering from the spoon-on-nose-balancing contest he, Thor, and Natasha were having.   
She laughed at that, rubbing her eyes with one hand. "No offense, but last time I road-tripped with you, I ended up having to replace almost all my car windows. And the radio."   
You could practically see Tony's ears perk at the mention of a mission he didn't know about. She held up a hand. "The rest of that particular trip is classified, I'm afraid." The inventor rolled his eyes dramatically, returning to the cup of coffee he was nursing and the bacon he had hoarded.   
Steve said, "Well, take at least one _someone _. Buddy system, remember."  
With a dramatic eyeroll, she picked up her laptop from the island. Pulling a knife seemingly from thin air, she nonchalantly twirled the dark silver blade over her fingertips before resheathing it. "Hunter, agent, assassin, remember? Not a damsel in need of a knight. Certainly not a knight in _Spandex _." Cap actually blushed a bit at that, probably remembering how ridiculously aesthetic his original suit had been.  
Natasha snorted at that comment, causing her spoon to fall to the table with a clatter. Sarah shook her head, an amused grin spreading across her face, and went out of the kitchen and down the hallway.   
Choosing the stairs instead of the elevator out of habit, she began the upwards journey to her room, mentally organizing what would need to go in her duffel and taking stock of the weapons in her car.   
"Nice to see you again, James," she said, while he was still twenty feet above her in the stairwell. The soft humming from the servos in his arm was a dead giveaway to who was nearby every time. "If you're looking for Cap, he's in the kitchen with everyone else." Sarah didn't get a response, and she didn't wait around for one. As far as she knew, Barnes was still pretty much a recluse and didn't much care for small talk. She could definitely respect that. She reached the third floor landing and disappeared down the hall without catching sight of him.   
~  
 _Sixteen cups of coffee, lots of classic rock, and fourteen-odd hours of driving later _  
~  
Gwen watched the grey Chevy pull into the drive through the front drapes. It was still drizzling, and the driver sat in the car for a moment before opening the door. It was a youngish woman, judging by her build and the little of her face that could be seen through the windshield. Gwen briefly considered moving away from the window in case she should be seen, then dismissed the idea. This was too interesting to miss.   
As the woman got out, she pulled her hood up against the rain. Closing the car door carefully, her fingers lingered on the handle for an extra second. Then her entire demeanor changed; her shoulders straightened, her chin lifted, and she walked to the door with a purposeful stride.   
Gwen was so preoccupied with watching the woman that the sharp rap on the front door made her jump a little. Feeling silly, she hurried to the door and unlocked it.   
The woman spoke first. Her accent was definitely Scottish, and quite thick, too. "You're Gwenivere?"   
"Yes, but, um, mostly people just call me Gwen. You must be Sarah?"  
The woman nodded in response. She-Sarah- slipped through the door and was in the foyer before Gwen could even think to stop her. "I'd like to get to the point, so please- pretend we already exchanged the usual human pleasantries and nattered about the 'orrible weather. Have ye been in the basement yet?"   
Gwen blinked. 'Human' pleasantries? By Alcott's tits, what _had _she gotten herself into?  
~________________________

**Author's Note:**

> Updates on this will be sporadic at best. I'm a full-time uni student who also lives and works on the family farm. If anyone wants to scream at me on tumblr, you'll fine me at theladyoffangorn.tumblr.com  
> If there's anything you'd like to see in this feel free to throw suggestions at me! I'm always open to ideas.   
> Have a lovely day and keep smiling- you made somebody's world a little happier today, somehow. God bless <3


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